Big Pimpin’ in the CU
Hip hop star Jay-Z came to Assembly Hall tonight for a concert. It was the biggest concert put on this semester at A-Hall, and was probably one of the most energetic. There were a bunch of other photographers that showed up, most of which i had no idea how they got credentialed. Some were from high schools and all of them except for Dean and I had cheap bodies with kit lenses. It wasnt the most ideal concert to shoot, we were crammed right up to the edge of the stage and could only shoot for the first 2 songs instead of the standard 3. I did however walk away with one shot that i really like, which is the horizontal one.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer and the Assembly Hall
Star Trails
Sorry for the lack of updates, its been way to long. Having 3 jobs and being a full time student really eats up all my time and its hard to get to posting on here. Any ways I now have a ton of free time (midterm hell season is over) and I will update this a lot more frequently. Last night Ned and I went out a couple miles south of campus to do some star trails, which i have never done before but Ned is a big fan. The first one was 50 minutes long, and my least favorite due to the huge amount of wins-flare caused by the headlights of passing cars and the slight amount of cloud that passed through. The second one was around 25 minutes and my favorite of the two. I wish i would have gotten the axis of the earths orbit in it, but that will be for another day. Growing up in the suburbs my entire life, i had no idea how many stars there actually are in the sky. It amazed me when we went out only a few miles from campus how many showed up. And i know we were still getting some light pollution.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer
Saving Abel/BuckCherry Show
Im now the official photographer for Assembly Hall here on campus, and last night i had to shoot Saving Abel and BuckCherry. I was looking forward to this because they were on the harder side of the spectrum in music, but still not my taste. Saving abel had no light at all during their show. My 5d2 struggled through out their set. BuckCherry’s set was a lot better and they had a lot more light, to much light actually. The singer was pretty pale and i kept over exposing his skin, or else the rest of the stage and everyone else would be underexposed. The guitarist for them also is a photographer and shoots with a leica M7 and we got to talking for a bit. He gave me his email so we could continue our conversation.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer and the Assembly Hall
Rosaline Show and Promos
I made it home last weekend to shoot some promos and live shots for Rosaline. They wanted me to use a fisheye, which was kind of interesting, it was my first time using one on a fully frame camera. The shoot went terrible, i had 3 bad cables in my bag, and they would only fire my strobe when ever they felt like it. but i did get some alright photos out of it. They were good live, but it sucked that they had to play first and only have a 20 minute set.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer
protest/rally/vigil thing
Sorry for the lack of updates, been really busy shooting almost every day. Yesterday as i was leaving my last class i get a call from Ned telling me i needed to be in downtown champaign at that very moment. I told him my camera was busy doing my homework (firing remotely via my computer off my balcony). He told me to grab his and run down there. After grabbing his nikon (yuck) i rode my bike to the down town and couldnt find anything there. Turns out i needed to go to downtown urbana and Ned told me the wrong city. So i had to ride my bike to my car and then drive to the rally. I made it to the rally, which was about the health care system, and only had a couple minutes to shoot because i had to make it back to my apartment to continue my homework. I got a decent image i think, its hard to make protest look visually interesting when there isnt any tear gas around that was thrown by riot police. Also Nikon cameras suck and pretty much everything on them is backwards to my canon. Also, i felt out numbered at this rally, everyone was liberal.
*Image copyright Brad Meyer and the Daily Illini
What i wake up to now
Granted this is taken at night, but this is the view from my new apartment on campus.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer
My first, and hopefully not last, Cubs game.
When i went to orientation for the Daily Herald, the photo editors told me and one of the other interns that it was possible for us to make it out to a couple cubs games this summer. They normally dont send staffers to any sport events anymore because they dont want to have to pay for photos they can just pull off of AP. But because i was unpaid, they didnt have much of a problem. I patiently waited the whole summer for the opportunity to arrise, and towards the end i realized i would have to start asking (constantly) if i could make it out. My photo editor agreed that he would do his best to get me out there, and after looking at the schedule, the best time for me to shoot was my last day with them, and at home in the suburbs in general. When i got the Wrigley, i had no idea where to go, and i found another photog and asked him. It turns out it was Phil Velasquez from The Chicago Tribune. He was a really nice guy and showed me around Wrigley and wished me luck. I got to the first base photo well 2 hours before the game started to ensure a good spot to shoot from. Crowd Management, as they are called, kept on asking to see my photo pass, most likely because not to many 19 year olds sit in photo well, and it got kind of annoying, but i guess im going to be getting that for a few more years. There were only 6 other photographers there, which is not that much from what i was expecting, and halfway through i switched sides and shot from the third base well. Being a Cubs fan, i was hoping for a great game and the W flag to fly over Wrigley, but that was not the case. The Cubs lost to the Phillies, and there was hardly any great action plays that happened, and the few that did either the umpires or base coaches got in my way. Also, I really wished i had a 1d mark II(I), the 5d is just way to slow in the fps department for baseball, and the autofocus is not the fastest to catch those quick plays. All in all it was a great expeirence and it made the Herald internship worth it in the end, and i cant wait to be sitting back in those photo wells (hopefully with my own 300mm 2.8 and a mark III).
*All images copyright Brad Meyer and the Daily Herald
Underoath at Warped Tour
So, yesterday i decided to try my luck and head down to Warped Tour to see if i could some how get a press pass and shoot the whole day. I was hesitant on making the drive because it was raining out, (you can see water drop refractions on my lens in some shots), and i want 100% sure i could get in with my camera equipment. I applied a couple times for a photo pass on the website to get access, but never got a response back, and when i arrived my name wasn’t on the media list. But just my luck and good looks, i managed to charm the lady that was handing the passes out and she gave me one (thank you newspaper credentials). I went in, met up with my friends at the vans main stage, and they said Underoath was setting up there. Underoath was the one band i really wanted to see on the tour, so i just said cya to them and ran up front to the photo pit area. I waited a couple minutes, other photogs started filing in, then all of a sudden the band came out of no where and went straight into their first song. I was the only photographer that got the first shot off of Spencer spitting into the air (you can see the others just standing looking up and around). Spencer was into it the whole time, and was nuts and never stopped performing. They performed amazing and im really glad i got to see them live. My buddy Kyle says i need to see them in a real concert venue and then my mind grapes will be blown.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer (that means dont steal these).
five oh first!
Todayi made it up to Carol Stream to shoot a pop-punk band, five oh first. The guys were really cool and gave me free reign on what i wanted to shoot. I came up with the idea over the weekend to shoot in a pool hall, and try something different rather then the guys just standing in a line doing nothing. They were for it and we decided to ask the local brunswick zone if we could shoot. Surprisingly BZ let us shoot with no problem at all, and the pool hall was huge and empty. I got the shots i visioned in my head and am really happy with them, heres 2 from the shoot.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer
The Good Old Toys tractor club
I had the only assignment on sunday for the Dupage area. It was to cover a bunch of old timers who are tractor nuts and shoot them in a short parade and having their tractors on display at Naper Settlement. I thought it was going to be easy, but tractors are really hard to shoot and get some interesting shots. The guys were really nice and were all friends. My photo assignment said get a shot of them driving down Aurora Avenue, so i camped out on the street when the parade was going on. But low and behold they didn’t take aurora avenue at all, so i pretty much got no shots of them driving on the streets.
*All images copyright Brad Meyer and the Daily Herald
